#66 Brush up on my Spanish

I love languages. Mainly because it means I can eavesdrop on other people's conversations, even if they don't speak my language. It helps that I grew up in Belgium, where we have three official languages (Flemish/Dutch, French, and German). It also helps that most of our TV programming is in English (language #4). But Spanish has always been my favourite, the beautiful sounds of the words are like music to my ears. I took my first course shortly before embarking on a four-month trip to South America. A couple of years later I spent a few months in Costa Rica as a volunteer reporter for a local TV station. It's the most fluent I have ever been in Spanish, even though I asked a toothless old lady about her dental hygiene on my first day of live interviews. This time I'm using my upcoming trip to Colombia as an excuse to brush up my Spanish. But really I'm just frustrated that I can only say things in the present tense, especially when working with some of my Spanish-speaking families. I'm not sure if I really got a lot better, but it's been fun spending every Thursday evening for the last two months with five retired people doing random presentations on random topics like garden tools, weird hotels, and body language. Here's hoping someone in Colombia asks me about lawn mowers while I'm there.